


Time and Memories

by tortoisegirl



Category: Watchmen - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe, Childhood Sweethearts, Children, First Kiss, M/M, Reunions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-07-24
Updated: 2009-07-24
Packaged: 2017-10-23 20:17:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,945
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/254515
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tortoisegirl/pseuds/tortoisegirl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A childhood romance is broken up then reunited years later.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Time and Memories

1.  
Daniel glances across the room at the redheaded boy hunched over his desk and sees intense eyes looking back at him. He smiles as his face colors and shyly looks back down at his work.

His lips are still burning.

Another quick peek. Walter’s pale skin is almost translucent in the sunlight, his freckles momentarily masked by the pink flush spreading over his cheeks.

Daniel can’t count the number of times he’s stared at those freckles, looking for the patterns that appear between the dots and are gone with the blink of an eye. But he knows he was looking at them this morning, when he and Walter were laughing about something and suddenly that freckled face was so much closer and Walter kissed him.

It was so quick it might have been an accident, so light it might have never happened. Might have been completely imagined, if not for the thrilling burning sensation that still lingers on Daniel’s lips.

As he stares down at the worksheet on his desk he wonders if Walter’s lips are still burning too.

Later, they stand together in a secluded corner behind the school. Walter leans against the wall, his vibrant hair clashing beautifully with the clean red bricks, and Daniel curls his hands gently over his shoulders. Walter is stiff beneath his touch.

“Daniel…,” he whispers, “Sure about this?”

“I’ve been thinking about you all day. I’m sure.”

And as he leans forward and presses his lips to Walter’s, he is sure. He doesn’t understand why- for what 11-year-old can understand their emotions when they’re suddenly thrust into their first love? -but his whole body, his entire mind is sure of the fact that this is right.

Walter moves his hands to Daniel’s waist and they stand there pressed together, awkward children sharing shy kisses against a red brick wall.

  
2.  
He refuses to cry because he knows his father expects him to. Knows he’s prepared for the outbursts, the accusations, the pleading, and he will not give him the satisfaction of being right. Instead, the tears that threaten to break his forced stoicism are shoved far down into himself where they join the fury and resentment and misery already boiling there, petulant anger at his father mixing with the all too grown-up sensation of a broken heart.

When his father finally discovered them, he’d raged. There was yelling, and slammed doors, and a long lecture that involved words like _wrong_ and _unnatural_ and _no son of mine_.

Daniel still doesn’t understand how it could be wrong when everything about being with Walter feels so undeniably right. The past few weeks with him had been nothing but sunlight and happiness. Everyday at recess they’d run together, jumping off benches with arms outstretched, pretending they can fly. Huddled over a textbook in the school’s small library, their hands would brush as they turn a page and Daniel would abruptly forget what it was they’re studying. Walking back to Daniel’s house after school they’d take the back alleys, where they could ignore the world to twist their hands in each others hair and lose themselves in long kisses.

But a carelessly opened door shatters their blissful world, the clichéd image of tearful cries and grasping fingertips becoming painfully real, and now Daniel is standing in an old monument of a building surrounded by people he doesn’t want to know.

The pomp and prestige of the new school hold no joy for him. The walls proclaim its importance with gaudy plaques and framed photographs, but Daniel marches through the hallways with unseeing eyes, his hands twisting in the fabric of his crisp new uniform, that hated outward sign of the distance forced between them.

His father tells him he’ll get used it, that he’ll come to see all the opportunities this school will offer – he leaves unspoken his obvious hopes for what the school will help his son forget.

Daniel doesn’t want anything from this place. There is only one thing he wants, and he is not here.

  
3.  
It is a gorgeous day, bright and breezy and clear, the kind of day that college campuses are designed for.

Daniel is stretched out under a huge spreading tree with a pretty girl nestled comfortably under his arm, a newspaper featuring a photo of a masked men spread across their laps. She beams at him and jokes that he should put his love of gadgetry to good use in the crimefighting way.

He raises his eyebrows, a wry smile curving his lips. Him, a masked hero- oh, how his father would _hate_ that.

A patch of sunlight filters its way through the leaves and illuminates mottled patterns on her dark red hair. It is beautiful, and Daniel lovingly runs his fingers through the strands before leaning down to kiss her.

He pulls away with a light tingle spreading on his lips.

His mouth twitches into small smile and he launches into a discussion about jet designs, happy to lose himself in the subject.

The human psyche has an interesting way of parsing the innumerable pieces of information that pass through, of deciding which bits are committed to memory and which are relegated to some deeper part of the mind beyond the grasp of consciousness. Years go by, thoughts pile up, and more and more memories are pushed back until they are nothing more than the slightest tug on the waking mind.

So though Daniel may sometimes have a fleeting thought about a boy he once knew, he can no longer remember the feel of lips brushing his for the first time, or the tightening in his chest as he touches freckled skin.

And yet…

Nothing is ever really lost– the truly important things will find a way to manifest themselves, even if they are no more than a tiny pull of _something_ that he just barely feels whenever he kisses her. There are too many years and too many memories in the way to make the connection, so Daniel doesn’t realize that the slight twinge of disappointment he feels with each kiss is there because somewhere, deep inside himself, he’s comparing them to the kisses he once shared long ago.

  
4.  
He’s not just Daniel anymore; now he’s Nite Owl too. When he’s in costume he is strong, he is powerful, he is more than he could ever be as just Daniel, and he eagerly embraces the identity of Nite Owl and the new life it brings.

Soon enough things change again and Nite Owl is no longer alone– the Nite Owl-Rorschach team comes into being and descends on the wrongdoers of the city, two masked men doing what they must to draw out the poison that sickens their world.

His new partner is a strange man- fiercely private, serious as the grave, and at times, relentlessly savage -but the brilliant way they function together is more than enough for Daniel adjust to some eccentricities, and the two of them easily settle into the routine of partnership.

But for Daniel something begins to stir below the surface, something so subtle that it doesn’t really register until after months of side-by-side-combat, something that goes beyond their comfortable camaraderie to pinch oddly at the back of his mind. Not déjà vu- it’s far too intangible to be called that- but a small spark that dimly illuminates some long-darkened chambers of his mind and awakens a sense of familiarity, a faint shadow of something he thinks he should be remembering. Something that urges him to look at a relationship that’s already threatening to spill over into friendship and consider what it would take to give it that little extra nudge.

That peculiar spark is unusually strong on the night he blurts out “It’s Daniel, actually. You can call me Daniel.” He’s not surprised when he receives a disinterested grunt in return, but a week later there’s a flutter in his heart, unsettling and completely inexplicable to his logical mind, when his partner uses his real name for the first time. A flutter that repeats itself whenever Rorschach accepts a clap on the shoulder without a flinch, or offers up the occasional “Good work, Nite Owl”.

More time slides by, bringing with it some brilliant victories, some bitter disappointments, endless patrols, and all the while Daniel quietly cultivates their strengthening alliance. Soon they reach the point of inevitability; their partnership has slipped into a tentative friendship.

The first time the word _friend_ is used it is strange – the word feels so natural in Daniel’s mind easily mingling with thoughts Rorschach, but hanging in the air between them it is heavy and painfully new. There’s a split second where the tension is palpable; a flicker of panic shoots through Daniel as he wonders if he’s gone too far, ruined everything. But Rorschach nods, and Daniel smiles - the moment passes and the rushing feeling in Daniel’s chest is so intoxicating that he doesn’t notice the intense moment of recognition that flashes through his mind.

For a while it’s enough. The warmth of an actual, recognized friendship with Rorschach settles inside Daniel like a steady flame, filling him, sustaining him in their brutal lifestyle. But then it returns – that nagging pull that’s telling him that things could go further, _should_ go further, and he’s the one who’s going to have to push it over the edge.

Before he knows it, Daniel finds himself wishing that his friendship with Rorschach would spill over into something more.

  
5.  
They are standing together in the Owl's Nest, in distant corner where the florescent lights can only throw spectral shadows against the dirty stone walls. In the dim light Rorschach’s mask stands out like a beacon, a spot of alabaster among the concrete and shadow.

Daniel is holding him against the wall with firm hands pushing solidly against his shoulders. Rorschach is stiff beneath his touch.

“Daniel…” he says quietly, and the name is a threat and a curse and a plea on his tongue.

Daniel is anything but sure. He knows what he’s risking as he holds his partner against the wall while his mind frantically tries to instill some reason into what he’s about it do. Images from their partnership together burst behind his eyes, all the weighty events and subtle details that slowly, through careful and arduous inches, closed the gap between them to bring them to this wondrous and terrifying moment. The weight of loyalty, friendship, betrayal, of long nights and weary muscles and life-threatening injuries presses on his chest – all of which is blotted out in a surge of emotion as he swoops down and kisses Rorschach.

It’s too forceful, clumsy, and overall awkward – none of which matters at all because Rorschach hesitantly parts his lips beneath his and the little unidentifiable spark of something that’s nagged him for so long ignites into that staggering sensation of rightness that’s been hidden away for far too long. It bubbles all through Daniel, taking hold of his whole being and singing _yes, yes, this is how things should be, you’ve got it right._

After a moment Daniel pulls away, stringing a thread of loaded silence between them. A pounding heartbeat echoes in the void. A sharp breath is hastily swallowed back. It is a mere whisper that severs the thread, strained and fluttering, as if it’s had to traverse a huge distance, as if it’s fought through the stretching depths of time and memory just so it could emerge here to be heard by two men standing against a dirty stone wall.

“Daniel.”

Daniel’s eyes flicker closed as leather fingers graze across his cheek.

His lips are still burning.


End file.
